


Coming To His Senses

by GretchenSinister



Series: My Top 20 Short Gen Fics [15]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 18:30:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19156561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister
Summary: Original Prompt: "Given what Pitch said, becoming a Guardian is like entering a contract of some sort. And as soon as it happens, your physical health/state becomes entirely dependent on how many believers you have.. and at the time MiM chose Jack, he had absolutely none. (And by the time he accepted it, he still had none, though when he actually took the oath it was a number. Less than ten, but a number.)Punch me in the heart, angst angst angst."I didn’t really manage any angst. But what I do have is Jack, who’s been making a corpse work as his body for 300 years, suddenly now coming to life with his oath. There’s a whole lot more sensation for him to deal with, now–a painful lot of it, actually. But also, he’s just plugged into an emotional link between all the Guardians. It’s no wonder he’s a little overwhelmed. But maybe he only wants to get used to part of all this.





	Coming To His Senses

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr on 12/5/2015.

He didn’t understand what he was feeling. The ice under his feet burned with cold, the wind—it was only a breeze, wasn’t it?—brushed roughly, incessantly, against his skin, the sunlight was so bright it made his eyes water. Even though he wasn’t near any of the pine trees around the pond, he might as well have stuck a branch up his nose. He could feel all the worn and rough patches on his pants, all the wrinkles of his sweatshirt, even though it had been a long time since he had adjusted any of his clothing. The scrapes and bruises of the last few days made themselves known again, even though the fight was over, definitely over.  
  
He took a breath, and immediately started coughing. The air was frigid—why had he taken a breath anyway? He could barely think right now, much less come up with something to say.  
  
And even beyond all this, he was feeling—he was feeling things that didn’t make sense. Pride that wasn’t his, happiness that wasn’t his, relief that wasn’t his, an admiration of his body that  _definitely_  wasn’t his, and now, more and more, worry that wasn’t his, realization that couldn’t be his because he had no idea what was going on.  
  
He felt a small hand lightly touch his own, warmer than he ever thought hands could be and then—this was Sandy. And Sandy was happy to be back and happy that Jack was a Guardian but he was also worried because Jack was coughing and he hadn’t asked any questions yet and…  
  
“I can feel everyone’s feelings,” Jack said—and was that his voice? It was so loud and he had thought the rushing of the wind was loud! And beneath it all there was another rushing, and even more loud, sharp, sounds, was everyone really yelling?  
  
Though it was hard to see in the incredible brightness, no one around acted like they were yelling—in fact, they all seemed almost like they were speaking more quietly than usual and Jack could tell it was out of concern for him—they loved him, they all loved him, and he—he couldn’t face this, was he  _supposed_  to feel this, to know this? How—what—there was too much, too much everywhere—  
  
Jack managed to say goodbye to Jamie—the other Guardians guided him to give Jack a very gentle hug, and there was so much kindness in the intent—Jack was pretty sure a lot of it was coming from Tooth—and still the pressure of Jamie’s arms against places Jack had been injured long enough ago that it shouldn’t matter and the brush of his sweatshirt was almost too much, and when Jamie promised he would always believe in him, Jack did cry, because how could he possibly contain his own feelings when he was already so full of everyone else’s?  
  
Tooth and Sandy guided him into the sleigh, and he thought he heard Bunny mutter, “I guess we’d better take him to the Pole,” but how could a mutter be so loud? Jack shivered and tried to hold Tooth and Sandy’s hands, but there was always too much information coming from them, not thoughts, but emotions, sensations, and it was still too, too much—and then they were in the air and the wind was rushing over them and it was sharp and it was cold and it  _hurt_ , how could the wind be like this? Jack cried out in pain.  
  
“Hurry, North,” Tooth called. Her voice was loud enough to hurt and Jack cried out again. He felt Sandy decide something and then there was the dreamsand, soft and gently warm as always, and he gratefully sank into sleep.  
  
*  
  
When he woke, he wasn’t wearing any clothes, but was lying on a bed covered in some sheets that were a lot softer than his pants and sweatshirt had been, so he didn’t care. The room was actually comfortably warm, and the light was at a normal level, though it all seemed to somehow be coming from only a couple very dim lamps. There was still a rushing in his ears, but the rest of the room was quiet. Taking further stock of himself, Jack noticed that he had some bandages on the worst of his scrapes, and some pale green salve on his bruises. They didn’t hurt much anymore, but—why did they hurt at all, when the impact was over?  
  
The door opened and Sandy came in. He was just as bright as the lamps! That made no sense. And—did Sandy  _feel_ Jack’s surprise and confusion? Because Jack could feel from Sandy a longing to be understood. He was about to just lie back down again when Tooth also came in. She gently closed the door behind her—or that’s what it looked like, but it sounded like she deliberately scraped and slammed it. Strangely, she was walking, but then again—what would her wings sound like to Jack now?  
  
Gratefulness joined his general alarm, and Tooth smiled. She stood at the far side of the room and whispered, but Jack could hear her perfectly. “Hi, Jack. Good to see you awake. You’ve probably guessed that as Guardians we can always tell that about each other, now. We weren’t expecting your oath to hit you that hard, but Baby Tooth told me a few things…which reminds me. Sandy, can you check his temperature?”  
  
Sandy rested his hand on Jack’s forehead, and he flashed a few symbols to Tooth. Her eyebrows shot up, but she was pleased with her surprise. “You’re going to be as warm as a human, soon,” Tooth told Jack.  
  
“What,” he croaked. “But I’m Jack Frost. I mean—that means something’s wrong, right? Like why I have all these bruises so long after the battle and—”  
  
Tooth made a soothing gesture. “There’s nothing wrong, Jack. What’s happening to you is just strange because…well…you were dead. Your disorientation, your hypersensitivity—you’d been making your dead senses work for so long that when you gave that kind of effort to living ones, it was too much. That’s what we’ve figured, anyway, based on how it feels to be you. The rushing in your ears is your blood flowing again. Your throat feels raw because you’re breathing all the time now. Your injuries hurt because now they’re actually healing like a living person’s.”  
  
She smiled. “Kind of shocking, I can tell. But…it’s better than the alternative. We worried that you’d be weakened when you took the oath, because you had such a small number of believers. But the oath just completed your return to life that the moon started all those years ago. It’ll take a while for you to get your magic back to what it was, but it won’t be so overwhelming as you do. We’ll all help you fly—well, except for Bunny, for obvious reasons—until you can again. And Sandy’s good with giving dreams that help belief.”  
  
Sandy nodded, and Jack felt his quiet pride.  
  
“So…right now I’m basically only human again?” Jack asked. He had no idea what to feel about that. Vulnerable, maybe. Humans died easily.  
  
“You still have your connection to all of us, and you can still make it snow, and make frost patterns,” Tooth said. “You were doing that in your sleep for a while, before Sandy let you sleep dreamlessly for the sake of keeping you warm and dry.”  
  
“Huh.” He looked to Sandy, who seemed to tell him that the frost and snow had been very pretty. “Thanks, little man. So, do I just have to wait now? To try and get used to everything again?”  
  
“I don’t know of any way to speed up the process,” Tooth said. “This isn’t a situation we’ve faced before.” Sandy signed something Jack couldn’t follow. “Oh—well—I guess you would know,” Tooth said to Sandy. She turned back to Jack. “Sandy says the more believers you get the easier it will be. Though you might have a little more trouble since you spent so long being a corpse.”  
  
“And I didn’t even realize,” Jack said, lowering his head back onto the pillow. “Um. So. Is it normal for my stomach to hurt, now?”  
  
Tooth paused for a moment, as if listening for something, and Jack could tell that she was using their connection. Even more strange, he felt as though he could keep her from doing so, if he wanted to, with only a little more strength. “You’re hungry,” she told him with a little laugh. She glanced at Sandy and shook her head. “You keep resting, Jack. Sandy and I will try to get Bunny and North to get you something that is even remotely okay for someone who just regained their senses.”  
  
They left—the door seeming just as loud—and Jack sighed and rolled onto his side. Now that he knew what was going on, things didn’t seem so overwhelming. But as for the connection between Guardians…he didn’t know if he could get used to that. He didn’t know if he wanted to. If he was extra-sensitive to that, now, too, well—he’d keep that. He’d keep the low undercurrent of love he felt from all the Guardians and between them. He’d keep that forever, if he could. He wondered what it would be like if they could feel it too, underneath everything else…and maybe that was Sandy, asking for patience, just before he nodded off again. 


End file.
